Complete HarpWeek Explanation:This unsigned cartoon (resembling the work of A. B. Frost) makes the simple
point that the grey eminence, Samuel Tilden, is controlling the candidacy of
Democratic presidential nominee General Winfield Hancock. Tilden, the 1876
Democratic presidential nominee, had retired from electoral politics, but
remained an influential behind-the-scenes powerbroker within the party
organization. Here, Tilden relaxes in slippers and hammock as he pulls the
strings of his Hancock puppet. On his barrel of money (signifying his
purportedly ill-gotten wealth) rests a fan and a glass of medicinal beef tea for
the sickly Tilden. (Beef tea is essentially beef broth, and was popular in
Victorian times for serving to the ill or invalid.)